Join Ralph Buglass from the Montgomery County Historical Society on June 2nd at 7pm for a discussion of one- and two-room schoolhouses in Montgomery County. The one-room schoolhouse symbolizes the earliest days of public education.
In Montgomery County a surprising number of those one- and two-room schoolhouses still exist—in one form or another. This presentation tells the early history of public education in the county, including the nearly century-long practice of school segregation dubbed “separate but equal” that was very unequal in practice.
Ralph Buglass is a retired communications professional, Montgomery County native, and graduate of Winston Churchill High School. He earned a BA in American history from Cornell University and an MA in journalism from American University. Ralph has been a volunteer docent at the restored one-room Kingsley Schoolhouse in Clarksburg, an experience that sparked a deep interest in the early days of public education in Montgomery County. He was the 2014 recipient of a national service award from the Country Schoolhouse Association of America for his volunteer work.
Ralph is a frequent speaker for Montgomery History on a variety of local history topics and a volunteer researcher for Peerless Rockville, the nonprofit historic preservation organization for Montgomery County’s seat of government. In 2020, with Peerless Rockville, he co-authored Images of America: Rockville, a pictorial history of the city’s 250 years. He taught lifelong learning courses at American University, Johns Hopkins University, Montgomery College, and Frederick Community College.